


with closing eyes and resting head

by matt_in_the_TARDIS_hat



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: M/M, Minor Andy | Andromache of Scythia/Quynh | Noriko, and then they start traveling together, nicky turns against the church and apologizes to joe, they all need sleep, this is mostly just a sketch of their sleeping positions over the centuries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-18
Updated: 2021-01-18
Packaged: 2021-03-16 07:41:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28827600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/matt_in_the_TARDIS_hat/pseuds/matt_in_the_TARDIS_hat
Summary: (Title is from "Sleep" by Eric Whitacre - take a listen, it is literally so peaceful and soothing! I recommend the recording by VOCES8 here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GeLW43SqqbA)Basically I read a bunch of fics that said that Joe and Nicky have always slept in that spooning position, and, considering my sleep position has changed several times in just 20 years, I had trouble believing that. So here are some sketches of their sleeping positions over the years! This is my first time writing fanfic since I was like 14, so I'm kinda rusty.CW: I don't think this has any triggering content? Very mild mentions of (canon-typical) violence and the canon angst involving Andy, Quynh, and Booker. If you think I should add a content warning for anything else, please let me know!
Relationships: Andy | Andromache of Scythia & Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 2
Kudos: 80





	with closing eyes and resting head

They didn’t always sleep like this, Joe pressed against Nicky’s back, a loaded gun within Nicky’s reach, just in case. They had grown into this. Their relationship, the world at whole, had changed so much in 900+ years.

Joe could remember it still, though at this point it felt more like a memory of a memory. It had been nearly two centuries after meeting before they began to share a bedroll, and this had been mostly prompted by their losing one of their packs. They had been attacked by commonplace thieves and had managed not only to die but to lose half of their belongings to the one thief they weren’t quick enough to kill.

It was different back then. Joe had been just as concerned that Nicky wouldn’t come back as he was now, but he didn’t allow himself to show it. He didn’t hold Nicky in his arms and wait for him to come back. They had been so cautious with each other, even after so many years of fighting and living together. He knew it had taken quite some time for Nicky to stir, though. He had slit three throats before he heard that familiar rasp of breath.

There had been around a century between their first several meetings in Jerusalem and their reacquaintance. Joe was in a small village near Babylon when they met again. It had been mostly an accident. Joe ducked behind a jewelry hut at the first sight of that familiar face. But Nicky had been speaking the regional variant of Arabic, not that strange Frankish garble Joe remembered. When had he learned Arabic? And why?

Why was he here, for that matter?

He had watched Nicky smile at a woman and speak softly. With an expression of sudden understanding, the woman gestured for him to follow her. Joe cursed under his breath and discreetly followed the two of them to a small storefront. Nicky ducked inside and the woman walked away, still smiling. Joe waited for Nicky to come out.

When he did, Joe didn’t hesitate. He pulled out his scimitar and held it up to Nicky’s pulsing carotid. Nicky’s were wide and the color of still pond water.

“Peace be with you,” Nicky had said to him. Joe told him exactly where he could stick his peace but lowered his blade slightly.

“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t kill you where you stand,” he growled.

“Well, I’d tell you that killing me would be futile, but you already know that,” Nicky smiled faintly. “So, instead, I’ll say this: I’m sorry.”

Joe froze.

“I have made myself your enemy, and I have destroyed countless lives in the name of a supposedly merciful G/d. I would do anything to have met you on that battlefield as a friend, and not as a foe. I was fighting for the wrong side.”

“So why are you here now? How dare you show your face?”

“I am not living a guilt-free life, trust me. I am here to repent for my sins. I have died countless times protecting these people from my brethren.”

“Are you a spy?” Joe had asked him.

“Yes,” Nicky had admitted quietly, and Joe’s shoulders had tensed. “But not for the Church. For these people. We are on the same side. I am determined to do what is right.”

From that point, they had become uneasy travel partners. Joe still hadn’t trusted him, not entirely, but there was a kind of relief in being among those like you, even if you didn’t like them. Whatever made them unable to die, he didn’t want to be alone in it.

When they first shared a bedroll, they laid back to back. It was less intimate like that, neither facing the other. And, as he remembered reasoning to himself, it was safer to sleep in a way where neither was vulnerable to outside attack. Better to sleep like shield brothers, trusting each other implicitly.

Even once they had enough money to buy another bedroll, they didn’t. Joe almost wanted to ask, but Nicky tactfully avoided the subject. And so they slept that way, back against back, a comforting point of contact that grounded Joe even when he had nightmares about two women dying again and again throughout the centuries.  
Around the time they met up with the women, Andy and Quynh, their sleeping positions changed. They both lay on their backs now, looking over at each other with coy smiles as they spoke in hushed voices under the brilliant silver moon. It wasn’t an irregular occurrence for Joe to fall asleep like that, looking at Nicky’s gentle face.

Andy had hated that stage in their relationship, or, at least, she liked to tell him that now. They had both been very repressed. Joe had liked Nicky a lot, and- he now knew- Nicky liked him back, but both interacted with the other with all the skittishness of two newborn colts.

When they finally admitted to each other, it was Nicky who went first. To this day, Joe is convinced that if Nicky hadn’t confessed, Joe would have stayed silent forever. He was too proud, and afraid to ruin the dynamic their group of four had developed.

Nonetheless, Nicky confessed, and Joe answered him wordlessly. It was impressive that Andy and Quynh didn’t pack up and leave them after the first twenty-four hours together. They fell asleep for the first time as lovers with their limbs intertwined, faces inches apart. They slept this way, tangled in a tender embrace, for several centuries.

It was only in recent times that they adopted the position they were currently in, Joe reminisced to himself. He watched the hairs on the back of Nicky’s neck flutter as he exhaled. It happened when the four of them stopped traveling together, Andy and Booker drowning their griefs in isolation and booze. Without that protection, Joe knew that Nicky felt vulnerable. And, more than that, he was protective. Joe might have been the big spoon, but he knew Nicky was always seconds away from shooting any attacker that might try to surprise them in the middle of the night.

It was hard to feel safe when you lived this kind of life, constantly paranoid and spending some days dying more than living. But sleeping next to Nicky, hearing the soft sounds of his breathing and feeling the steady rhythm of his heartbeat, slow and relaxed, made him feel safe. It was a kind of trust that enveloped his conscious and subconscious in equal measure. It was as though his body reacted to Nicky with an, “oh, there you are. Why were we ever apart?”

Joe held Nicky tighter and took a deep breath in through his nose, relishing in the scent of Nicky’s shampoo. As if in response, Nicky exhaled, a soft deflation of his chest, and his hand tightened around Joe’s.


End file.
